Sunday, March 9, 2014

This post has been revised to correct the mangling of some copy when a word processor document was transferred to the blog.

The corruption that characterizes
South Dakota’s
economic development efforts reaches deep into the economy and culture of the
state.The stage was set when the state changed
its usury laws to accommodate the credit card banking companies that eventually
came to Sioux Falls
for their high interest lending operations.The relationship of state officials to businesses with larcenous and
coercive principles of fleecing the public grew from the obsequious to the collusive,
as officials liked to think they were among the economic movers and shakers. The coterie of economic rulers includes state officials,
local government and economic development officials (recall that Huron and
Flandreau also took flings at the Northern Beef Packers scheme), lawyers and
law firms, and corporate officials, who insist nothing is criminal if you call
it a business decision.

The business mentality in South Dakota has been
ruinous to education in the state.Education
and research require an integrity and good purpose that are considered
impediments in the business world.When
the business mentality intrudes into matters of academic research and the
processes through which knowledge is created, it subverts and eventually
demolishes those intellectual enterprises.Two examples of how this works in South Dakota
are the efforts to convert the Homestake goldmine into a underground research
laboratory and the establishment of the Center
of Excellence for International
Business at Northern
State University.

When the proposal to
convert Homestake into a national underground research laboratory was proposed,
almost every major physicist, physics department, and scholars in related
fields signed on in support.The goldmine
had ideal features that made it eminently suitable as a place to conduct
underground experiments, and those features are why it was eventually selected
by the National Science Foundation as the site for a national lab.But the owner, Barrick Gold of Canada,
had a business decision to make.It
did not want financial responsibility for an environmental cleanup of
destructive pollution that it left behind from its operation of the mine.It made eventual transfer of the mine for
laboratory purposes contingent upon being relieved of responsibility for any environmental
damage.If it did not get its way,Barrick threatened to shut down the water
pumps that keep the mine dry.Which it
did.

At that point, the
scientists realized that real science did not have much chance to be done in
circumstances where a corporation was intruding its attitudes and values.The business mentality more adversely affects
and is a greater danger to honest science than the physical phenomena that
scientists conduct their experiments in mines to prevent from compromising
their small particle research.All but a
very few scientists abandoned the hopes of having a premier research facility
at the old Homestake Mine.

Then Governor Mike Rounds
tried to revive the conversion project by making it an economic development
project.In South Dakota, there are few people,
especially among the state leadership, who understand that basic, reliable
research cannot be done with the aim of devising products for making
money.The engineering that produces
useful and high-tech devices, such as resulted from space exploration, is
dependent on science.Experiments which
are contrived for the production of goods are unproductive and produce unsound
conclusions that do not meet the standards of scientific knowledge.The idea of operating the laboratory as part
of an economic development program drove the national and international
interest in the lab away and eventually the National Science Foundation, which
had led the effort to convert the mine, withdrew its professional and financial
support.The lead scientists explained
that the project was being developed in a way that is inconsistent with the
objectives and standards of scientific
research.The conflict between science
and economic schemes was never explained or discussed as the issue that ended
scientists’ interest in Homestake as the site for a major research laboratory.

Money
contributed by Denny Sanford which created the Sanford Underground Research Facility
has revived the mine-as-labon a smaller scale than originally planned
and important, significant experiments are taking place.But there is an irony involved that keeps
scientists restrained and cautious about its development.The Sanford
money comes from the usurious proceeds of a credit card company and brings with it
the lingering aspect of the business mentality that is such destroyer of sound
research, knowledge and education, which are the ultimate objectives of real
science.

---

The
establishment of the Center for Excellence in International Business at Northern State University
on its face seemed consistent with academic and scholarly objectives.However, as its programs developed, its
emphasis quickly turned from the study ofeconomic and business practices to involvement in economic development
schemes.It was started during my last
years as a fulltime faculty member, and I recall the concerns and skepticism
about the program on campus, throughout the state system, and in national
professional and academic organizations.On campus, there was concern about a changing mission in the
university.It was established and continues
to claim the educating of teachers as a main part of its mission.However, the College
of Business had overtaken the College of Education in the number of students and
programs it had.This was exacerbated at
one point in the mid-1980s when the College of Education lost its
accreditation, which diminished interest on campus but set up circumstances in
which NSU lost its eminence as the leading supplier of the state teaching corps
to sister institutions.On campus, the
growing emphasis on the College of Business was felt in particular by the College of Liberal Arts as the course requirements
in language, history, science, and social science were reduced for students to
make room in their schedules for courses more germane to business.One of the criticisms that came particularly
from other state institutions was that the major in international business did
not include a foreign language requirement.And the College of Business took the English as a Second Language
program for foreign students away from the College of Liberal Arts
and established its own program.There
was a Friday night meeting among the college deans during which the changes in
course requirements were made that was known as the Friday Night Massacre
because it signaled that departments that offered majors in the arts and
sciences were being reduced to service departments that offered token courses
to meet the minimal liberal arts requirements for accreditation.The vocational programs were in effect
dictating the curriculum.The decisions came down from the Board of Regents based on enrollment and course registrations. The Board is business-oriented and often contemptuous about academic considerations. To paraphrase Oscar Wilde, they tend to know the cost of everything and the value of nothing.

The
Center for Excellence in International Business spawned an academic anomaly
called the South Dakota International Business Institute which sponsored some
institutes and other program for students and faculty, but quickly got into the
business of economic development.The
development activities were supported by academic money and university resources.In reviewing the academic programs at NSU, a
new president was apparently troubled by a university program being devoted to the
support of a commercial enterprise and found the arrangement inappropriate.The SDIBI was removed from the NSU campus and
quartered in the offices of the Aberdeen Development Corporation where it was transformed
into the South Dakota Regional Center,
the main purpose of which its to recruit and managed EB-5 loans through which
foreign investors in American companies can obtain visas for residence in the U.S.The Regional Center
and its handling of funds and contracts is at the center of the troublesome
scandal revealed by the bankruptcy of the Northern Beef Packers.

There
is much quibbling about the legal maneuvers which amount to a shell game about
the Regional Center’s relationship to state government agencies,and the ruling party which holds major
responsibility for oversight is frantically denying, covering-up, and outright
lying about government roles in a scandal in an attempt to skirt criminal charges.However, the documents involved in setting up
the Center for Excellence in International Business reveal the questionable
establishment of the South Dakota International Business Institute.A most telling event is that the law on which
its establishment is based is repealed effective in 2015.

A key
basis for looking at the relationship of the SDIBI to the
university is the Regents Policy Manual:

SOUTH DAKOTA BOARD OF REGENTS

Policy Manual

SUBJECT: Relationship of
Curriculum and Instruction to Statutory Objectives

NUMBER: 1:1013-9-

Curriculum and instruction
at each institution shall conform to statutorily established objectives.Planning and operation of curriculum shall be
in accordance with individual institutional guidelines. A statement of the
statutory institutional objectives must appear as a part of the catalog published
at each institution.

---The Board recognizes and affirms its responsibility to serve as a catalyst for and as a resource to the economic development efforts of state and local governments. Faculty and staff expertise provides a valuable resource to various agencies of state government and to regional development efforts Inherent within this responsibility is the desirability of expanding programs and services beyond the physical boundaries of the institutions to provide greater access to quality higher education opportunities for South Dakotans. The Board acknowledges the programs and services offered by the private and tribal institutions in the state and the desirability of cooperation with these institutions in program articulation and delivery.

The
NSU catalog in fulfilling its required statement of objectives states them this
way:

Mission Statement

The legislature established Northern State University
to meet the needs of the State, the region, and nation by providing
undergraduate whicand graduate programs in education and other courses or
programs as the Board of Regents may determine. (SDCL 13-59-1)

The Board implemented SDCL
13-59-1 by authorizing graduate and undergraduate programs in education to
promote excellence in teaching and learning, to support research, scholarly and
creative activities, and to provide service to the State of South Dakota, the
region, and the nation. The Board approved a special emphasis on E-learning in
the university curriculum and service.

Specific mention is made of the role that the Center of Excellence
for International Business plays in college’s mission:

CENTER OF EXCELLENCE IN INTERNATIONAL BUSINESS
In 1997, the South Dakota Board of Regents designated Northern
State University’s
School of Business
as a Center of Excellence in International Business,
with the goal of creating a nationally recognized program in International
Business. The Center has created an International Business major focusing not
only on international business courses, but also on language and cultural
training. The Center also provides both students and faculty the opportunity to
have an international experience through exchange programs, conferences, and
other international experiences. Northern’s Center of Excellence
in International Business also sponsors an annual international business
conference that is ahettended by faculty, students and business people from
around the world. The Center provides today’s students with the scholarly and
theoretical foundations to become tomorrow’s international business leaders.nen

SDCL 13-59-1 cited as the authority for the college’s programs reads this
way:

13-59-1.Names, locations, and purposes of schools--Degrees authorized by Board of
Regents. The primary purpose of Northern
State University,
at Aberdeen in Brown
County, and Black
Hills State University, at Spearfish in Lawrence County,
is the preparation of elementary and secondary teachers, and a secondary
purpose is to offer preprofessional, one-year and two-year terminal and junior
college programs. Four-year degrees other than in education and graduate work
may be authorized by the Board of Regents.

The establishment of the Center for Excellence and the SDIBI turned Regional Center which it spawned rests with the
Board of Regents.

The state law on the purposes of higher education
is:

13-48A-3.Goals for postsecondary education. The
Legislature hereby recognizes that the current goals for public postsecondary
education systems and institutions are as follows:

(1)To increase the number of graduates for
the state's workforce; and

(2)To increase the growth capacity of the
state's economy by increasing the innovation and development capacity of the
state and by increasing the skills of the state's current workforce. (This
section is repealed effective June 30, 2015 pursuant to SL 2013, ch 81, § 5.)

Note in particular the parenthetical statement at the end of the section announcing
the repeal of the law:(This section is repealed effective June 30, 2015 pursuant to SL 2013,
ch 81, § 5.)

The pertinent aspect to note in this repeal is the
clause that authorizes economic development activities as part of higher
education’s mission:“To increase the growth capacity of the
state's economy by increasing the innovation and development capacity of the
state…”

Somebody somewhere must have convinced somebody
that economic development and honest education and research do not mix.

Some tough facts regarding the development of South Dakota are that it
ranks at the very bottom of the states for its openness and integrity of
government.It endorses low pay for
fulltime workers so that they cannot afford food, shelter, transportation, and
healthcare without assistance.It has
reduced public education to political indoctrination.It discourages those with talent and ability
and forces them to leave the state in search of opportunity and the benefits of
freedom, equality, and justice.

The Homestake and Northern Beef-EB-5 events have
branded South Dakota.Its economic development notions closed the
door to serious and significant science, but some work is till being done
because of the laboratory efficacies of the old gold mine.The state seems to be unique in its handling
of EB-5 investors and money, and with that reputation what investors are
foolish enough to trust it again.Especially
with the state legislature engaged in covering up the incompetence, the fraud,
the criminality.

At this time, South Dakota is the nation’s prime example
of what subverting education and honest knowledge with shoddy, fraudulent
business schemes does to a state morally and economically.Decent people want no part of it.

Update: Word was released to the press today that President of NSU, Dr James M. Smith, under whose leadership the university bolstered flagging enrollments and academic programs, including the Center for Excellence in International Business, is one of two finalists for president of Murray State University in Kentucky. Murray State has an enrollment of 10,000 and a very strong liberal arts program.

2 comments:

Thank you for this analysis. i did not know these details of the involvement of the BoR and state officials in NSU and the Homestake mine lab; it is really a travesty. It does seem that the business model has been adopted in SD higher education, to an even greater extent than in some other states (although it has been increasingly implemented throughout the country), and more detrimentally toeducation and science here as well.